His Lunchbox

I can’t remember the color or what it looked like. You’d think I’d remember something that significant. This thing that seemingly controlled our lives. This symbol that noted what our days would be like, whether he would be just a fleeting ghost in the house or whether he would be the drunk-but-present, non-father-figure we hated to see.

That damned lunchbox. I think it was a small lunch-sized Igloo and I’m probably just making up that it was red and white because that was the classic ‘80s Igloo. But it was the kind with the titling triangle lid that slid down to reveal the interior. Everyday he took that box to work and every night he came home, emptied it, and put it in its place of honor on top of the fridge. My 4^th grade self knew that was something important to my father. And I knew that if I was to communicate with him it had to be via that lunchbox. During the week when it was parked on the fridge I knew he would see a note placed inside it, and Dad would be sober enough to read it. Not on the weekends. Not only did he not use the lunchbox on the weekends but he wouldn’t be sober enough to give my note a fair chance. So, I devised my plan. I would write a letter that would save our family – one that would spell everything out and change our lives. It would completely result in our dad having the epiphany of his life and becoming the father we all wanted him to be.

I pulled out a school spiral and began composing the most pleading, eloquent letter any 9-year-old had ever written. I begged him to stop drinking. I begged him to stop smoking. I begged him to love us. I explained how much it hurt my feelings that he spilled his beer on my Bible. I pleaded with him not to get drunk on the weekends so we could do things that normal families do – things like fishing and camping and taking trips. Or at least that’s what I assumed normal families did. I signed it, “I love you, Dad. Love, Amy.” Then I ripped it from the spiral, leaving the classic messy edges that still annoy me to this day. I carefully folded the paper, waited for him to go to bed, then pulled a chair over to the yellow fridge. I placed the paper in his lunchbox then went to bed, sure that by the next afternoon our lives would be different. This would be the pivotal moment for our family. He would hear such wisdom and love in his little girl’s words and he would beg us for forgiveness. We would soon be a real family.

The next day, I woke like it was Christmas morning. Dad was already gone to work, as he was each morning when we woke. The lunchbox was gone. I couldn’t wait for him to get home, for him to be changed, for him to pick me up and be the dad I’d always wanted. The kind of dad that does things like picks up his daughter and hugs her. But something caught my eye as I walked by the kitchen table. In the corner next to the table was the trashcan. That huge freaking black industrial-sized trashcan which was the only thing that could keep up with a family of seven. On top of the trash was torn up pieces of paper. The edges had that annoying fraying from being torn from a notebook, and my handwriting was on it. There would be no change, no hugs, no dad stuff that day nor the days after. I can’t imagine what went through his mind when he read my letter but he must have been angry – enough to rip it to shreds. Who does that? What kind of father would rip up his daughter’s heartfelt letter? A father with PTSD. One who sees everything as a threat. One who is barely hanging on to sanity and sees change as the enemy. I didn’t understand that as a child but as an adult child of a veteran with PTSD I understand it all too well. I understand the anxiety and the depression and the longing to control the world around me. I understand the fear of change and the anger that comes when change occurs and it’s not my idea. I understand that he would have chosen differently if he could have. He would have scooped me up and kissed my face and became the dad we all desperately wanted. That’s not how it went though, and I understand it now.